Setting up a Root name server

[Michael Voight]

chris wrote:
> >
> > Since when does using nslookup to query a root server have anything to do
> > with local DNS setup,
>
> Since DNS was invented.
> Funny, I thought you could run nslookup on a machine that has an empty
> resolve.conf and still query a root server...
> 

nslookup doesn't use resolv.conf. 


>
> > A response NEVER came? Did you get a timeout message?
> > What was the query?
> >
> 
> Yes, they timed out. I'm not trying to say that you can't always get a root
> namesever I'm just saying that sometimes your resolver isn't going to be able to
> reach it's first choice root name server(or second..).

How do you know what it's first choice was?? Nslookup doesn't show it.

 The guy that pointed this
> out to me said to me in a kinda frantic voice "The name servers are down" .. My
> first thought was how the hell did all my nameservers drop at once. He then
> pointed out that he couldn't get a query off of 3 root servers in a row. We
> checked pings and traceroutes to the servers to verify that it wasn't a network
> problem.

How do you know if any of those nameservers were being used by the
resolver? It usually pick the one with the fastest rtt.

> > > a root server on my network, and get our local nameserves to query it, and
> > > have our customers nameservers query it, it will speed things up.

Ok, and if that root server is busy or down???

Michael